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Drayv'n Culture Places and Tech
The Drayv'n Homeworld is Xull, and their home realm is Arae. In the Dray tongue, these are always combined, thus they consider this place Xull'Arae. While the Tanathian Empire was largely human, it contained minority aspects of many other races primarily because the origin world contained them as well. And thought that world's name and history are lost in the fog of time and disaster, one can see something of what it must have contained when looking at the different races of the Tanalithic Realmhead. The Drayv'n were one such race, likely given access to skeins by the Tanathians for the purpose of establishing their own colonies. We don't know much about how the Tanathians operated, but it can be assumed that the Drayv'n bargained for the right to colonize other realms, and that their colonization of Xull came from some agreement established with the Tanathian Empire. Why the Drayv'n chose Xull'Arae is obvious when considering the planet itself. It was a world that had cooled quickly and contained a deep crust. Plate techtonics weren't a factor here. The crust of Xull extends tens of thousands of miles down. Below this, a molten mantle and core still exists, but unlike most habitable worlds, on Xull it is far far deeper. This gave the Drayv'n - an underground dwelling version of Elven lineage - a clean pallete to work with and build their society. The Drayv'n and the Drathraq are actually the same species, but the Drathraq have taken to vampirism through a magical transformation that occurred thousands of years ago. The Drathraq all inherit their nocteene (the substance of their particular form of energetic vampirism) from Nachtaff, their God-Emperor. The Drath don't feed on blood alone, they eat meat too, and emotions, life force, and soul. This power is then converted to nocteene and chemical and mental nourishment. But, emotionally, the Drathraq and the Drayv'n possess a slew of concepts surrounding emotion that are entirely alien to humans. Pain and pleasure, good and evil, are all relative concepts to them, and all are embraced with intensities that go beyond human understanding or tolerance. They view human experience as a pale lifeless existence in comparison. Culture Drayv'n culture is complex in many ways. They are a species obsessed with artwork, and thus even their most primitive items are created with aesthetics in mind. They possess a large pantheon of hundreds of gods, demi-gods, daemons, angels, and powerful elemental forces. Some of these are mythological, others are based on actual entities that exist or were discovered in other realms. Technologically, the Dray are highly advanced. Their magic has grown through their experimentation - a process that was not highly regulated amongst their race. Morally and ethically, the Drayv'n do not have issues with torture, extreme body modification, slavery, eugenics, forced sterilization, forced breeding, or soul-binding. In short, they had no laws or internal motivations that would prevent them from trying whatever technomagical technique they wished to investigate. Psionics The Drayv'n are well-endowed psionically. This was not always the case. At some point not long after their colonization of Xull'Arae, a Drayv'n Emporer decided that the Drayv'n race needed some sculpting and set out to kill any Drayv'n who weren't psionically endowed to some degree or another. This led to huge civil wars, and billions of deaths. When it was over, nearly all the Drayv'n remaining had psionic capacity in their blood lines, and it is very rare to encounter an Dray or Drath without some form of telepathy. Telepathy is the main capability. Other talents such as telekinesis, pyrokinesis, and cryokinesis also exist among the Drayv'n, but these are rarer and frequently become specialties. Magic is sometimes combined with psionics (the two operate on different principles, but have similar effects). Xull-Arae Once, much of the surface was swamps, plains, and Forest. When the Drayv'n colonized Xull, they cleared many areas on the surface. They lived underground, but Ka falls mainly on the surface. Some of it penetrates deeply, but it isn't as strong as on the surface, so the Drayv'n constructed huge lenses to focus it down into the depths of their world. These "N'lnga" pits channeled the focused t'cha down to crystal pyramids that relayed the energy throughout the Drayv'n underground. When Nachtaff released the Kuduu onto Xull, it took over the surface first, and the N'lnga lenses were overgrown very quickly, reducing the power available to the Drayv'n, and lessening their ability to fight back. A better name for these pits coudl be "Zenotapfs." This is a play on Cenote and Tap. As they are on the surface, and the Unions are far below ground, one of the most important roles of the life forms that don't exist in stone (the servants of the Unions) is going to be absorbing te'cha and bringing it back to the Union for use in powereing the Trilius. To this end, the Changlings of various forms are still employed, sent up to seek the light and power, then bringing it back. Float Stones The Drayv'n used float-stones long before colonizing Arae. Over the centuries, their techniques advanced. Float stones are no longer "stones" but rather chairs sitting on top of an ornate stone shell filled with mechanics that retract metal legs. These devices can still "float" if given Ka, but they can also walk. Typically, the Drayv'n used them to fly from place to place, and then landed, moving small distances as they wished by walking them around. They weren't all that common, and they were expensive, so mostly used by the wealthy and nobility.